


trigonous

by spookykingdomstarlight



Category: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, DC Cinematic Universe
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Getting to Know Each Other, Trust, Wonder Woman Compliant, post-bvs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-21
Updated: 2017-06-21
Packaged: 2018-11-15 17:14:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11235561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookykingdomstarlight/pseuds/spookykingdomstarlight
Summary: It was work toward their shared goal or go to bed with thoughts of the past ricocheting against the walls of her mind. It was just one of those nights. That happened sometimes, especially when she came here. She still didn’t know why it troubled her so between the four walls of the room that was now hers. Then again, Bruce was the only person in the world who knew anything about her. Perhaps a part of her knew that and chose to use it against her. And yet, there was nowhere else she’d rather be.





	trigonous

**Author's Note:**

  * For [engmaresh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/engmaresh/gifts).



The first time Bruce Wayne invited her back to his home—though home was a bit of a stretch for it, the word ‘home’ brought warmth and love and familiarity to Diana’s mind, not grand, empty, _dark_ spaces; then again, Diana’s idea of home had altered slightly in the decades since she left hers, so perhaps she knew nothing on the matter—it was merely out of convenience. His money bought technology. His company _built_ technology. Technology that could help them locate metahumans.

“Make yourself at home,” he said. His arm cut carelessly through the air around him to encompass the entirety of the room he’d led her to. It was no more comfortable than the rest of the grounds and a great deal more intimidating and gloomy. The bright glare of computer screens cut through the dimness, rectangles of light toward which she and he were drawn like moths. Elsewhere, stray bits of metal and wire, tools and equipment spilled across a number of tables. Each was, by the look of it, its own unique project. Bruce’s lips thinned and quirked at one corner. “Alfred’s a bit of a tinkerer,” was the vague answer to her unvoiced question. The truth was likely much bigger than that.

She tilted her chin toward a flight of stairs that remained almost hidden until she noticed the slight gleam of the stainless steel railings. “What’s down there?”

“Nothing,” he said, too quick to be an honest, easy answer. “The suit.”

“Your suit?”

Whatever humor he’d found in foisting responsibility for the room’s mess onto Alfred drained from his face. His features went cold and hard and still. A statue would have had more life than him at that moment. She’d overstepped her bounds and she knew it, but she didn’t back down. Whatever was down there, he’d have to deal with eventually. It didn’t have to be now and it didn’t have to be with her—it wasn’t like she couldn’t sympathize, after all—but she refused to gloss over the question. There were few kindnesses in the world of men and she would not expend one on him. Not yet. Perhaps not ever.

Bruce would understand.

“That, too.” The answer was cryptic, spoken as though he’d ground the words to dust between clenched teeth.

Perhaps she would one day learn the truth of his words, but today was not that day.

So she nodded instead, locked her questions in the back of her mind, a skill she’d first learned in the early days of her time away from Themyscira. “Let’s get to work.”

He nodded back at her, the tension leaking from his shoulders as a bit of color spread across his cheekbones. It was a good look for him, relaxation. She might have enjoyed seeing more of it. But now was not the time, so she locked that thought away, too, allowed it to mingle with all those questions she didn’t speak.

 _Another time, then_ , she promised herself. Perhaps when she herself was more willing to speak of her own past, her own struggles and failures. It only seemed fair. And Diana was nothing if not that.

*

“So,” Bruce said, casual, and she knew him well enough to see that sign for what it was. Danger. Annoyance. The very real possibility that he was about to suggest something very foolish. They’d been at this for a while, searching for metahumans, trading information between Gotham and Paris and back again. Two steps forward, one step back. He guided her toward the Aston Martin, its body sleek and shiny despite the gray, lacquered sky. Away from the usual bustle of the airport, it seemed almost serene. Then again, the world always did seem a little bit emptier when Bruce was around. She’d reached the conclusion that money above all bought privacy and space. The quiet exit from the terminal only confirmed that. Whether he preferred it this way or not, she hadn’t yet decided. She herself liked the solitude well enough. “Welcome back to Metropolis.”

“Mmm. Thank you,” she said. Bruce didn’t always retrieve her from the airport himself. Sometimes it was Alfred. Sometimes, a driver. But this time he did, even going so far as to offer to take her bags. She’d said no, of course. She packed light always and they were barely a burden. And even if it had been otherwise, it was still her responsibility. “But I think I prefer Gotham.”

Bruce smiled and though she couldn’t accuse him of a puffed up sense of hometown pride, she knew he was pleased. “And why’s that?”

“You can’t guess?” she asked in turn, peering at him over the top of the car. He stalled in the act of reaching for the door. A divot formed between his eyes. There was stubble on his cheeks, no thicker than the last time she’d seem him. It comforted her in a way. This was one thing in the world that pretended it was unchangeable. While other people grew old and died around her, she could pretend Bruce was practically ageless, too. It was a foolish, childish notion, but it amused her all the same.

Why she might want to, she didn’t allow herself to think upon. Finding the others, forming a team, that was the important thing.

His eyes crinkled at the corners, the humor in them subdued and well-worn. He’d settled noticeably since they’d met and he brought a quiet sort of charm to bear, tipping his head forward slightly in acknowledgment. “I suppose I could try.”

Ducking her head, she swung the passenger’s side door open and slid in. She’d forgotten to place her bags in the backseat before and quickly shoved them through the space between the front seats before Bruce climbed in, too.

“Mysterious women prefer the straightforward,” he said, grandiose. It was a joke, perhaps, but not wholly untrue for all that. At least when it came to Diana. She wouldn’t have called herself mysterious and she couldn’t speak for other women, but she did like things to be straightforward. “Gotham doesn’t hide what it is.”

“And yet Gotham’s protector hides himself behind—”

“—a ridiculous batsuit, I know. Trust me, Alfred’s said the same so many times, I—”

“—I was going to say Gucci actually.” She pinned him with a quick, sharp glance. It was, perhaps, a good thing he wasn’t driving yet, because the wide-eyed look he gave her in return might’ve resulted in an accident. It was shuttered almost immediately, that look, but the damage was already done. Diana had already seen more than enough to reach a conclusion or two.

Looking away, he cleared his throat. His reflection was visible in the dark glass of his window, but the image was distorted, inaccurate. She couldn’t guess what he was feeling based on it and so she didn’t try.

She didn’t apologize either despite the itch of awareness that suggested she should.

“Let’s get back to the manor, shall we?” he said finally, his tone tight with formality. Every hint of pleasure, puffed up or otherwise, dissipated from his visage. But he wasn’t angry, not at her anyway. His entire being seemed to turn inward, away from Diana. As he maneuvered the car from the stretch of temporary parking he’d claimed as his own before picking her up, the tires squealed in protest and the handful of corrections he had to make on the road were jerky.

She didn’t complain, but once an appropriate amount of time passed, she admitted to something she hadn’t intended to broach. Not ever. Not with anyone. But Bruce wasn’t just anyone. Bruce was a man who did the right thing when he had every reason to look the other way. Bruce was a man who knew he wasn’t good and prevailed anyway.

Bruce reminded her a lot of another man she once knew.

“Thank you for returning my picture. The original.”

Bruce’s fingers tightened around the leather stretched across his steering wheel. His eyes never left the road. “Who were they?”

As she peered out onto the quiet back road Bruce had chosen to drive on—he always took back roads when he could, Diana wasn’t sure why—she drew in a deep breath and watched foliage blur green and yellow and red as they drove past. This was why she hadn’t intended to say anything. It opened too many old wounds. “Friends,” she said, a simple lie of an answer.

Bruce shook his head, clicked his tongue against the back of his teeth. “They weren’t just friends.”

“They were everything to me for a time. They _were_ friends.” This was as truthful as she could be.

“What were their names?”

“Sameer.” She paused. How long had it been since she’d spoken of them? “Chief. Charlie.” She looked down at her hands where they curled in her lap. The urge to pick at the perfect burgundy polish on her nails nearly overwhelmed her. “Steve.”

“They were your team.”

She smiled at that. Indeed, it wasn’t a question. “Yes,” she said, “they were.”

“And now they’re not.”

“And now,” she said, clipped, “they are not.”

“I know the feeling.” A frown tugged at Bruce’s mouth and he drew in a sharp breath, like he hadn’t expected to say that. “I’m sorry.”

“As am I.”

Both she and Bruce remained quiet for a short time, the sound of the wind whipping at the car and the quiet hum of the engine the only noise to disrupt the silence. It would’ve been fine with her if neither of them spoke for the rest of the ride back.

“So I’ve got a beat on a fishing village who claims they’ve got the Aquaman looking out for them.” Bruce’s attention briefly flitted to her. The deadpan eye roll he offered was something like a white flag, a truce, a return to normalcy. If men who rose from the sea constituted any such thing. Diana could claim a strange enough life, but this stretched even her credulity. “Might be our guy. Patron saint of the fishes.”

“That’s true.” Diana clung to it regardless. “He may be.”

Bruce offered her a small, apologetic smile before launching into the bare bones of the research he'd done in her absence, the research that he hadn’t trusted to the Internet.

The car ride went a lot faster after that. Their arrival, and the immanent work that arrival would entail, closed in more quickly than she’d expected. In a way, that was a blessing. And in a wholly different way, it was not.

*

“Would you like a drink?” Bruce asked, half slumped against the island in the center of the room. He didn’t seem surprised to see Diana as she stepped into the overlarge kitchen and might even have expected her if the spare glass was any indication. The lights were surprisingly bright given the hour and the gray-brown hardwood floor, which she’d expected to be cold beneath her feet, was warm against her skin.

“It’s a bit late for that, isn’t it?” she asked, pulling her robe tighter around her body. She strode toward him and peered down at the scene before her. His hair stood at odd angles, like he’d run his fingers through it and hadn’t seen fit to fix it, and there were circles beneath his eyes that telegraphed his exhaustion from across the room. The decanter that sat near his elbow still looked full at least.

He hadn’t been at it long.

“Couldn’t sleep.” He tipped his glass away from him. What little remained in it sloshed against the side. Then he lifted the glass and downed the rest. “I’m sorry if I woke you.”

“No, it’s fine,” she answered. And it was—or would have been. “You didn’t wake me.”

“Victor Stone still proving elusive?”

“Yes.”

Bruce nodded like this was a reasonable thing to be doing at three in the morning. Maybe for him it was.

It was work toward their shared goal or go to bed with thoughts of the past ricocheting against the walls of her mind. It was just one of those nights. That happened sometimes, especially when she came here. She still didn’t know why it troubled her so between the four walls of the room that was now hers. Then again, Bruce was the only person in the world who knew anything about her. Perhaps a part of her knew that and chose to use it against her. And yet, there was nowhere else she’d rather be.

“We’ll find him,” Bruce said after a long, considering pause. “The kid, too.”

“I know we will.” She allowed herself to smile, though she felt no cheer at the thought of an accomplishment yet undone. “We found Curry, didn’t we?”

“Might’ve been a close call.” Bruce palmed the line of his neck and tilted his head back and forth. His mouth curved into a wry, rueful smile. “But yeah, we did that.”

Stretching across the smooth, whorled wood of the counter, she snagged the decanter from Bruce’s side. Grasping the spare glass, too, she poured a small measure of amber liquid into it. The warm color sparkled against the crystal surrounding it, found a rich, pleasing depth despite its paleness. It didn’t burn going down as she took an investigative sip.

As far as scotches went, she couldn’t complain.

“To what are we drinking?”

Bruce’s eyes narrowed and he looked past her to the wall opposite him. His jaw clenched and for a moment she didn’t think he’d answer.

“Come with me,” he said, jerking his head toward the door. Diana followed quietly, managing to keep her questions to herself, but only barely. Taking another sip of her drink, she focused on the severe lines of his back, the rigidness with which he carried himself. The wool of his vest stretched perfectly across his shoulder blades, pleasing to her eye despite, or perhaps because of, the lateness of the hour.

He led her to the workspace she’d come to think of as a second home almost for how often she found herself there. Then, he led her toward those stairs she’d never been down before. Her heart pounded against her breastbone. As they descended the stairs, she felt like she wasn’t glimpsing something she hadn’t earned and didn’t deserve. “Bruce…”

Bruce turned, one eyebrow arched high on his forehead. “I had a team once, too. I don’t anymore,” he said, quiet, rueful again. “Or I didn’t.”

She thought about Superman and what happened with him, how Bruce had convinced himself he could take that chance, how she herself had done the same. Teams meant weakness, but they meant strength, too. Diana had been better with Steve and Sameer and Chief and Charlie. Diana was better with Bruce.

She hoped the same was true for him.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Gotham happened,” he answered. Their steps rang out as they descended the final few steps. “Gotham always happens to good people.”

There was a glass case nearby, a dark, humanoid shape filling it nearly to full. Armor, once she was close enough to make it out, sensors tripping the lights inside the display. Yellow paint was scrawled like violent slash marks across the chestplate. Whoever did this was cruel, sadistic. Nobody deserved this kind of treatment. Nobody deserved the _reminder_ of this kind of treatment.

“His name was Jason,” Bruce said. His hands fell to his hips, his drink hanging awkwardly between two fingers. “Good kid. Good friend. After… this, I thought I was better alone.” He turned toward her, peered down at her in such a way that she thought he might see right through him. “You helped changed my mind.”

She wasn’t a girl any longer and she wasn’t the naïve woman meeting a man for the first time and entering the larger world for the first time, too. The emotions she experienced weren’t new—in fact, they were very, very old—but it had been so long…

There was nothing she could say, really. Rather, there were too many things. Easier, then, to reach out, grasp his free hand in hers, link their fingers together and squeeze tight. “For me, too.”

She wanted more than to hold Bruce’s hand, but for now, it was enough. They were partners when Diana never imagined she’d have another partner. That was more than enough.

The quiet sigh, the wide, relieved smile he gave, like he felt the same, that was everything.


End file.
